Page 131 - Lokmanya Tilak Samagra (khand 2)

116 SAMAGRA TILAK- 2 • THE ORION

tells us that a hunter by name Orion was transformed after J;Us
death into this constellation which consequently came to be called
after him. But this is surely no satisfactory explanation. Who is
the hunter that was so transformed ? There are many mytholo-
gical proper names in Greek which can be traced back to their
Aryan originals, and why should Orion be not similarly derived ?
The story obviously points to the Vedic legends of. Rudra, who
is said to be still chasing Prajapati in the heavens. The Vedic
legend has fully preserved all the three elements in the story-
the hunter Rudra, the dog and the antelope's head, while the
Greeks appear to have retained only the hunter and the dog with
nothing to hunt ! But that does not preclude us from discovering
the identity of these legends and the question is whether we can
suggest a Sanskrit word which will give us Orion according to the·
already established phonetic rules. I know of no name of Rudra
from which Orion can be so derived. But if we look to the names
of contellation of Mrigashiras, we may, I think in the absence
of any better suggestion provisionally derive Orion from Sanskfit
~ .
Agrayal}a the original of Agrahayana; the initial long a in Sanskrit
may be represented by omega in Greek as in Sk. ama, Gk. omos,
Sk. ashu, Gr. okus, and the last word ayarUJ may become ion in
Greek. It is not, however, so easy to account for the dropping
of g before r in the body of the word. Comparison of Sk.
grrivan with Gk. laos and of Sk. ghrdrJa with Gk. ris, rinos,
shews that the change may take place initially, but scholars
whom I have consulted think that there is no instance in which
it takes place medially between Greek and Sanskrit, though such
changes are not rare between other languages as in Old Irish
ar, Cymric ear, which K. Brugmann• derives from agra. Also
compare Gk. dakru, Goth. tagr, Old Irish der, English tear;
Latin exagmen, examen, 0. Ir. am from the root aj. I do not
feel myself competent to decide the question and hence must
remain content with simply throwing out the suggestion for
what it is worth. I have shewn that traditional coincidences clearly

• Comp. Gram., Vol. 1, Arts. 518-523. Prof. Max Mi!ller extends
the rule to Greek and Latin, see his lectures on the Science of
Language, Vol. II, p. 309, where several other instances are given
For a full statement of the phonetic difficulties in identifying Gk.
01ion with Sk. /ig,l}'fl1J•I, see App. to this essay.